American Aurora
Page 14
Nothing can display, in a more strong or pleasing view, the spirit of national honor … than the associations of young men similar to that now set on foot. I am informed that between three and four hundred attended the first meeting … There are few young traitors; ones that have spent their early years in France [like Benjamin Franklin Bache]; and been reared and educated under examples of cunning prudence; and in the maxims of hypocrisy and the wisdom of fair appearances.
Tonight, in the Porcupine’s Gazette:
Mr. B. F. BACHE. As a member of the meeting held at Cameron’s on Saturday evening last, I thank you for the colouring you have attempted to give their proceedings; you could not have imagined a panegyric more pleasing to the feelings of the youth of Philadelphia … Holding you as the tool of a disorganizing faction and as a full fledged scoundrel, they consider [that] your countenance to their measures would disgrace them …
A Member of the Committee.
Bache must soon wind up his business here, and he will doubtless take his flight to France, that land of liberty and equality, which he is so well fitted to become a subject of … [Bache] is poor, very poor; has not the money he has advanced and the protested notes which are unpaid place him in critical circumstances? Does he not owe his papermakers, his journeymen, &c. &c. &c.? and as for Callender, his demi-devil … to keep his family from starving …, I would here recommend to the smoaky wig’d pauper to accept of Bache’s valuable copy rights in part pay …
The raucous Federalist dinners and recruitment of young men into the Macpherson’s Blues have disquieted Republicans.313 Tonight, Republicans hold their own dinner in the Northern Liberties district of Philadelphia.314
Tonight, the President of the United States and entourage attend Philadelphia’s New Theatre to hear the patriotic song “Hail Columbia.” Porcupine’s Gazette reports:
THE PRESIDENT, accompanied by his LADY and the OFFICERS OF THE GOVERNMENT, honoured the theater with his Presence. The reception he met with cannot be so well described as by saying that it was such as he merits and has a right to expect from a grateful people. The moment he entered the box, the whole audience rose and expressed their affection for him in enthusiastic acclamations that did honour to their hearts. Mr. HOPKINSON’s song was repeatedly sung, the last stanza was every time encored, and the audience, men and women, joined aloud in the chorus …315
President Adams will now appoint Joseph Hopkinson to a federal position.
WEDNESDAY, MAY 2, 1798
GENERAL * AURORA * ADVERTISER
A citizen, being asked whether he would keep the 9th of May as a day of fasting, answered dryly: “I am not of the opinion that in Adams’ fall, we sinned all.”
Today, President Adams answers an address from the citizens of Baltimore, Maryland:
[D]ivisions are generally harmless, often salutary, and seldom very hurtful, except when foreign nations interfere and by their arts and agents excite and ferment them into parties and factions … Such interference and influence must be resisted and exterminated, or it will end in America, as it did anciently in Greece and in our own time in Europe, in our total destruction as a republican government and independent power.316
Tonight, in the Porcupine’s Gazette:
THE PROCEEDINGS OF
The Young Men of Philadelphia.
At a general meeting of the young men of Philadelphia, of the District of Southwark and the Northern Liberties, convened by public notice at the house of Mr. Cameron, Shippen-street, … the following resolutions were proposed and unanimously adopted, viz …
2d … [W]e cheerfully pledge ourselves to obey with alacrity the first summons of our country in resisting the invasion of a foreign enemy …
Samuel Relph, Chairman
(Let BACHE and his French clan growl at this. I can very well excuse the wretches; for if anything can convince them of the ruin of their cause, it is the generous enthusiasm that has here made its appearance. The pledge of the young men of the capital of the Union to fly, on the first summons, to the defence of this country is not a vain and empty boast …)
Tonight, in the Gazette of the United States:
THE MANAGERS of the Theatre deserve much credit for the honourable and splendid manner in which they received the President last evening … [N]o man who was not there can have an idea of the loud bursting enthusiasm, the heartfelt rapture with which they received their respected President, and the constant shouts and huzzahs which rang through the house in honour of him through the whole evening. The National Songs met with unbounded applause. “Firm—united—let us be” was the universal sentiment; and this chorus was joined in by the audience with general enthusiasm and great effect. If I hated Bache and some others even more than they hate the country and government, I could not wish them a greater punishment than to have obliged them to be at the Theatre last evening and to have witnessed the joyful return of American feelings … In the course of the night … a great number of gentlemen, accompanied with a Band of Music, serenaded the President and the Heads of the Departments and the author of the Song, with the new Song “HAIL COLUMBIA! happy land.” The spirit of America is aroused—Let its enemies beware …317
To the Citizens of Newark, in the State of New-Jersey,
GENTLEMEN … I know of no further measures that can be pursued to produce an amicable adjustment of differences with the French Republic. THE delusions and misrepresentations which have misled so many citizens are very serious evils and must be discountenanced by authority as well as by citizens at large, or they will soon produce all kinds of calamities in this country …
JOHN ADAMS
The Youth of Philadelphia and Liberties are informed that a copy of the address to the President is deposited at the Library, to which, between the hours of two and six P.M., they may place their signatures if they think proper—Also at the City Tavern.
THURSDAY, MAY 3, 1798
GENERAL * AURORA * ADVERTISER
On Saturday, the 21st instant, “near a hundred staunch federalists” (to use their own words) “assembled at James Cameron’s tavern, in the district of Southwark …” [I]t appeared a perfect scene of riot and confusion. These hundred staunch federalists drank no less than thirty-two staunch toasts to each of which they gave exactly 9 cheers … [T]hese hundred staunch federalists roared like a hundred bulls …
Today, Thomas Jefferson notes in his journal:
The Presid[en]t has … app[ointe]d Joseph Hopkinson Comm[issione]r to make a treaty with the Oneida Ind[ia]ns. He is a youth of about 22 or 23 and has no other merit than extreme toryism & having made a poor song to the tune of the President’s March.318
Today, Thomas Jefferson writes James Madison:
These [towns] and N[ew] Jersey are pouring in their addresses, offering life & fortune. Even these addresses are not the worst things … Whatever chance for peace … is compleatly lost by these answers [of John Adams].
Nor is it France alone but his own fellow citizens against whom his threats are uttered. In Fenno of yesterday, you will see one wherein he says to the address from Newark, “The delusions and misrepresentations which have misled so many citizens must be discountenanced by authority as well as by the citizens at large.” … What new law they will propose on this subject has not yet leaked out …
The threatening appearances from the Alien bills have so alarmed the French who are among us that they are going off. A ship, chartered by themselves for this purpose, will sail within about a fortnight for France, with as many as she can carry …
Perhaps the Pr.[esident]’s expression before quoted may look to the Sedition bill which has been spoken of and which may be meant to put the Printing presses under the Imprimatur of the executive. Bache is thought a main object of it.319
Republicans are afraid. Tonight, there is a meeting of Republicans at John Shnyder’s at the sign of Robinhood.320
Today, in the U.S. House of Representatives, the Annals of Congress report:
NATURALIZATION LAW.
Mr. ALLEN [Federalist, Connecticut] … [T]here are citizens of several other countries who … have dispositions equally hostile to this country as the French … Mr. A. alluded to the vast number of naturalizations which lately took place in this city to support a particular party [the Republican party] in a particular election. It did not appear to him necessary to have the exercise of this power [to expel aliens] depend on any contingency, such as a threatening of invasion, or war, before it could be exercised. He wished the President to have it at all times … to remove at any time the citizen of any foreign country whatever …321
Tonight, the Porcupine’s Gazette publishes a death threat from the “Young Men” who gathered at Cameron’s:
That Child of infamy Bache or his clipt and pauper associate Callender affects to despise the young men who have agreed to offer their personal services in defence of their country if necessary and calls them half fledged men. It appears to me who am one of the half fledged men that the dastardly vagabond trembled as he wrote …
You may inform him, Sir, … that although there is not one of the half-fledged men who would be backward in conferring upon him such chastisement that he not long since received from Mr. Humphreys or such as his beastly franking friend suffered in the Hall of Congress, … it would be unfair to deprive a very useful man of the fee which he may expect shortly to receive for doing the last kind office to the grandson of a Philosopher, and it is a disgraceful thing to see the miscreant riding to his long home with a pair of black eyes… So wishing him a happy and speedy deliverance from all his afflictions, I remain.
A Half Fledged Man
As Wednesday the 9th instant is appointed by the President of the United States as a day of solemn humiliation, fasting, and prayer, notice is hereby given that the Bank of Pennsylvania will be shut on that day, and that all payments … must be made on the day preceding.
By order of the Board.
Jonathan Smith, Cashier.
Tonight, in the Gazette of the United States:
LOST—by the Editor of the Aurora.
THE PEOPLE.
FRIDAY, MAY 4, 1798
GENERAL * AURORA * ADVERTISER
Mr. Allen [Federalist, Connecticut] on the 20th [of April] ult. made the following observations in the Federal House of Representatives:—“Let me add, as no contemptible engine in this business of sowing discord, dissension, and distrust of the Government, a vile incendiary paper published in this city …” [&c., &c.]
[Congressman Allen’s remarks on the Aurora follow.]
Remarks on the Above by the EDITOR OF THE AURORA
Mr. Allen’s speech is in the hackneyed style of the abuse which has been unceasingly poured on the Aurora... The opposers of any measures of administration will always be called … “incendiaries, sowers of discord, dissentious, and distrust of government …”
Mr. Allen should never mention the words “discord, dissension, and distrust of the government, &c..” This is the very man who the other day in Litchfield in Connecticut, expressed strong doubts as to the permanency of the Federal government; spoke of his political opponents as rascals; and rounded his … speech with the remark that if those “rascals” could not be put down, the government is not worth preserving, &c …
We want no “septembrizing” [massacring] to get rid of men such as Mr. Allen. It is only necessary that the People should be acquainted with the truth to throw them in the back ground …
We have as much stake in this country at least as this very Mr. Allen. If he is a native of it; so are we. Does he plume himself upon the foolish pride of ancestry; let him make the comparison [with our roots in Dr. Franklin.] Has he a family to attach him to the country; and so have we; one as dear to us as his can be to him: We have something more to attach us here: it is that very constitution which he has talked of subverting; those principles which he is endeavoring to sap.
As to the dark insinuations of this paper’s receiving foreign support, it is scandalous and false. The Aurora is bottomed upon the support of the persons who individually subscribe for it, & of those who advertise in it. It has never been upheld by the donations of private individuals, much less by foreign aid.
Today, President Adams writes the inhabitants of Chester County, Pennsylvania:
Those lovers of themselves, who withdraw their confidence from their own legitimate government and place it on a foreign nation or domestic faction or both in alliance, deserve all your contempt and abhorrence.322
War measures … Today, John Adams approves and signs into law:
AN ACT
To enable the President of the United States
to procure cannon, arms, and ammunition
and for other purposes.
Be it enacted, &c, That a sum not exceeding eight hundred thousand dollars shall be, and hereby is appropriated … to purchase as soon as may be, a sufficient number of cannon; also, a supply of small arms, and of ammunition and military stores to be deposited and used as will be most conducive to the public safety and defence, at the discretion of the President of the United States.323
John Adams also approves and signs into law:
AN ACT
To authorize the President of the United States
to cause to be purchased, or built, a number of
small vessels, to be equipped as Gallies, or otherwise.
Be it enacted, &c, That the President of the United States be, and he is hereby, authorized … to cause a number of small vessels, not exceeding ten, to be built or purchased, and to be fitted out, manned, armed and equipped as galleys or otherwise in the service of the United States … [and t]hat there be appropriated for the purpose aforesaid the sum of eighty thousand dollars …324
Tonight, William Cobbett in the Porcupine’s Gazette:
I am happy to inform my readers that the Young Men of New York are following the example of those at Philadelphia. A correspondent proposes that the young men [of Philadelphia] who sign the address … should, when the address is delivered, assume the [black] American Cockade and never leave it off till the haughty and insolent foe is reduced to reason. This is, I observe, already adopted at New York; and it is certainly proper. The hand writing at the bottom of the address is seen but by few persons; whereas a cockade will been seen by the whole city …
Tonight, Thomas Jefferson presents letters on the discovery of mammoth bones to a meeting of the American Philosophical Society. Eight members of the society attend, including the newly elected Polish writer Julien Niemcewicz.325 The meeting breaks up about ten-thirty, though Jefferson and Niemcewicz will remain awake for many hours. Niemcewicz:
On my return from this meeting at half past ten in the evening … General [Kosciuszko]’s servant told me that his master asked to speak with me … [W]hen we were alone, [the Polish General Kosciuszko] said, “I leave this night for Europe. I leave alone … I beseech you to tell everyone that I have gone to take the waters in Virginia. You will leave Philadelphia in three days and you will go in that direction saying it is to rejoin me.”
Too moved, too agitated by all that I had just heard, I could not close an eye. At one o’clock in the morning, I left and roamed the streets … At 4 o’clock a covered carriage arrived with Mr. J[efferson] inside. K[osciuszko] got in … With my eyes I followed the carriage as far as I could. They took a route completely opposite from that to the harbor. I do not know for whom this precaution was taken, for all the world slept. I learned later that they had gone by land up to New Castel where a boat awaited him … This departure, so precipitous, so concealed, so stealthy, caused general astonishment … How in this time of mistrust and suspicion is one to explain this clandestine voyage …?326
Tadeusz Kosciuszko has departed for France to join any French effort to liberate his native Poland from czarist Russia. He has entrusted his last will and testament to Thomas Jefferson.327
SATURDAY, MAY 5, 1798
GENERAL * AURORA * ADVERTISER
On Friday night last, a
Club of Jovial citizens attacked the sign of Citizen Julien on which was wrote “a perpetual Alliance between France & the United States.” These formidable patriots conveyed it to the place of execution and demolished it sans ceremonie … This is emblematical of the disposition of the British faction …
On Thursday, the “true Republican Society,” composed of between eighty and one hundred members, assembled at John Shnyder’s at the sign of the Robinhood. A handsome dinner was provided …
Republicans are organizing. Benny will need their help.
Tonight, in the Porcupine’s Gazette:
SIR, In a letter to the committee … I requested them to call on every one who may sign the address to wear the [black] cockade in order that they may be known, and as the propriety of this cannot be called in question but by cowards, I have not a doubt when they notify the addressers to meet, that they will make known that request … I am, &c.